Jason Timpf reacts to Nikola Jokic and the Denver Nuggets BLOW OUT win over Anthony Edwards and the Minnesota Timberwolves in Game 3 of the second round of the NBA Playoffs. Jason explains how the Nuggets were able to get back into this series by blowing out Minnesota, and discusses whether or not the Nuggets can come back and win the series. Later, Jason reacts to Tyrese Haliburton and the Indiana Pacers 111-106 win over Jalen Brunson and the New York Knicks. Can the Pacers even up the series on Sunday? #volume
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
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(01:52):
welcome to tonight. You're at the volume. Happy Friday, everybody.
Hope all you guys are having a great start to
your weekend.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
Gonna hit both of tonight's games.
Speaker 1 (01:59):
The Denver Nuggets show some unbelievable championship medal, go into
Minnesota and somehow do a worst number on them than
Minnesota did to Denver in Game two and completely change
the psychology of that series. Obviously a lot of work
to do still to get the win if that's what
they're interested in, but a very dominant first step in
(02:20):
that direction tonight, and then the Indiana Pacers get a
much needed win to avoid the the vonted three to
zero hole against the New York Knicks to get another
crazy clutch Knicks game that the Pacers escape on a
game winner from Andrew Nemhard and a little bit of
a grifty mistake from Jalen Brunson late.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
Two excellent playoff games.
Speaker 1 (02:40):
We're gonna hit them both from the perspective of all
four teams. You guys are the Joe before we get started.
Subscribe to a brand new YouTube channel so you don't
miss any more of our videos. Follow me on Twitter
at underscore JCNLTS. You guys, don't miss an announcements. Don't forget
about a podcast feed wherever you get your podcast under
hoops tonight. In the last but not least, keep dropping
mail back questions in those YouTube comments. We can keep
hitting them throughout the post season. So let's talk some basketball.
(03:02):
I was so excited for this game. Honestly, like the
build up of the three full days off was actually
kind of nice because it just kind of built the
suspense for this specific game. I think these sourts of
situations are what generate the great moments in NBA history.
No one ever talked about a great moment in NBA
history that was a sweep.
Speaker 2 (03:23):
No one ever did. Sweeps are boring, they're dominant.
Speaker 1 (03:26):
What really brings the memorable the NBA history moments the
once we watch on NBA TV when we're watching old footage,
the one we tell stories about. They usually involve some
kind of adversity. This was one of the things, especially
as a younger basketball fan as I was in the
mid twenty tens, It's one of the things I didn't
(03:46):
like about the KD Warriors. They just beat the shit
out of everybody, and everyone was like it was cool
and it was a beautiful brand of basketball, and obviously
it was cool to see KD get to the mountaintop,
but like they won fifteen straight playoff games, Like they
won fifteen straight playoff games, so like it never had
(04:07):
that real, that feeling of like overcoming adversity. And I
got in trouble with some Nuggets fans yesterday for a
social media clip where I basically said, hey, this is
their first time with some real adversity, and everyone pointed out, well,
what about the you know, trying to win with faku
Compazo and and Will Barton, and it's like, yeah, yeah,
those were that was bad shit happening to your team.
(04:30):
But that wasn't adversity in the sense that there weren't
There were no expectations on that team. No one on
those teams, No one really expected Denver in twenty twenty
one or twenty twenty two to win with Nikola Jokic
by himself. If anything, it was like incredibly impressive that
he managed to beat that Portland team by himself. Right,
oh yeah, but we were down three to one in
the bubble. It's like, yeah, but that was kind of
(04:52):
your coming out party. No one really believed in in
that core until that. But the bubble is where Jamal Murray,
Nicole Jokic, that's where they kind of came to the
forefront as the as the one of the next great
kind of playoff corps that we see around the league.
Right the last year was the first time there was
real expectation on the Nuggets, and they passed with flying colors,
(05:15):
dominated most of the regular season, dominated in the postseason.
Came into this year, I thought it was a more
than fine kind of Denver regular season. Most of the
issues they had had to do with beating good teams
without Jamal Murray, which again is difficult. Anytime you're without firepower,
you're going to struggle against the good teams. But in
this series, this is the first time they have faced
(05:36):
true adversity where there's real expectations. You have the consensus
best player in the world, you are favored to win
the series, you have home court advantage, and you get
your ass kicked in Game two to go down two
before you head on the road to Minnesota. And again
this is what These are the types of scenarios that
breed those big moments. When you think back to the
(05:58):
best moments of Steph Curry's career, what do you think
you think about Game four against Boston in the twenty
twenty two NBA Finals when Boston Stolehork home court from
them and Boston beat them handling in Game three, and
Game four was like, we have to win this game
or we are going to lose the series. And Steph
(06:18):
has forty something, they win, he gets Finals MVP, they
win the trophy. That was an amazing moment, arguably the
best moment of Steph Curry's career, and it happened because
of adversity. In order for Lebron to go on the
road into Boston and drop forty five and humiliate that
team to tie the series and send it back to Miami,
(06:40):
there had to be adversity. They had to fall down
three games to two. They had to face a road
close out game. That's why I love these moments, and
that's why I was so excited for this particular game.
This was our first chance to see what desperate Denver
looked like.
Speaker 2 (06:55):
And Wow, that was unbelievable. They beat the shit out
of them.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
They completely dominated them mentally and physically throughout the game.
And I can't overstate how huge psychologically tonight was. Because
when you have a long shot task in front of you,
you need to believe that you can do it. Like
if you're trying to get into Harvard Law, you better
(07:21):
believe that you can do it, right, or you have
no chance. You're trying to be a professional athlete. It's
a one in a million shot, right, you better believe
you can do it. And I thought it was so
interesting after Game two when they had that practice and
Mike Michael Malone was quoting stats, is like, yeah, something
like this. Many teams have come back from down oh two.
(07:44):
This smaller number of teams have come back from down
oh two with losing the first two games at home.
But what was the first thing he said after that?
He's like, well, we've come down from three to one twice.
You can tell there's just that little inkling of belief
there at the beginning, Like, yeah, like having to win
four games in five tries against a team that has
like that's been literally constructed to beat us, That's a
(08:06):
lot to ask. It's a very difficult challenge that lays
in front of you, and you.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
Have to believe.
Speaker 1 (08:11):
And by virtue of going in there, you did two
things tonight. You got the series to two to one,
and you have effectively erased what happened in Game two,
not in the standings from the standpoint of the way
the series shook out, but simply in the psychological element
of that game. That game, as Mike Michael Malone Michael
(08:31):
Malone pointed out, was the game where Denver crumbled in
a way he had never seen them crumble before. And
the way they crumbled it they crumbled under physicality, they
crumbled under intensity, they crumbled under emotion, and like getting
into it, the refs, and like all of those factors
shifted heavily towards Denver. In game three, they conquered those demons.
(08:54):
Those demons popped up for one game and they immediately
conquered them. In game two. You not only did you
win in a domint fashion, you did so with your
offense breaking out in a way that it couldn't in
the first two games. You did so with Jamal Murray
looking like Jamal Murray again. Twenty four points, twenty one,
shots above fifty percent, shooting above forty percent from three
that that is huge.
Speaker 2 (09:16):
You demonstrated I'm Jamal Murray.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
I can do this, and I think that's important because again,
like coming out of that game, what did I say,
everyone was talking about the calf, And everyone was talking
about the calf again tonight, and I'm not gonna sit
here and underplay that and pretend like three full days
off doesn't help a guy with the calf injury. Of
course it does. And he definitely looked physically good tonight.
But the majority of the reason Jamal struggled in game
(09:43):
two had to do with him getting into it with
the refs and getting all worked up in emotional and
he lost sight of the ultimate goal, and he played
shitty basketball.
Speaker 2 (09:52):
That's why he lost.
Speaker 1 (09:54):
And in tonight's game, he handled the ball pressure better,
he set up his man for screens better, from the
from the opening tip, he just had a much more
focused basketball, non emotional basketball approach, and he was able
to flip the script. So many factors tilted his way
and so many factors tilted Denver's way, and it completely
(10:14):
changed the psychology of the series. I would argue you
even won convincingly enough to do some damage to Minnesota's belief.
That was the first time in seven postseason games that
Minnesota looked like the regular season Timberwolves. There are reasons
why I picked against Minnesota against Phoenix and why I
picked against Minnesota versus Denver, and it had to do
(10:35):
with actual things that happened on the court in the
regular season. Bad shot selection, inconsistent defensive effort like foul trouble,
all of these different things that ended up being issued
from Minnesota periodically throughout the regular season. They have avoided
those things in this postseason run, and man, did it
look like they regressed in a big way tonight. And
(10:55):
we're gonna get more into that later, but that to
me is the other part of this. You tilted a
lot of the mental dynamics in this series. So again,
I just before we get into some of the more
some of the more nitty gritty stuff with the basketball,
I just was so excited for this game because this
is where this stuff happens.
Speaker 2 (11:13):
This is where you get the cool moments.
Speaker 1 (11:14):
This is where when you tell the story of Nikola Jokic,
You'll when you tell the story of Jamal Murray, when
you tell the story of the Nuggets, you'll talk about
these kinds of moments.
Speaker 2 (11:22):
Right. They're the moments when things aren't going well. When
you look back, like.
Speaker 1 (11:27):
What's the least discussed championship in Lebron James's history, it's
usually the Bubble. Why because they dominated the regular season,
started twenty four and three, kicked everyone's butt, got into
the postseason, kicked everyone's butt. Even though they beat good
teams along the way, no one cared because they just
dominated everybody. You know, what are the ones that everyone remembers.
Coming back from three to one to beat Cleveland, Right,
(11:49):
coming back from three to two to beat Boston, coming
back from uh three two to beat San Antonio, Right,
that's that's where these big, real moments in NBA his
three come from. Let's talk about some of the basketball, though,
because like one of the things that I thought was
the defining characteristic of this game was if you had
(12:11):
to come put it down to one specific thing, it
would come down to Denver competing physically better. But that
manifests in a bunch of different ways. And the main
thing I want to focus on is how Denver got
their offense working.
Speaker 2 (12:22):
Now. I actually thought one of the the we're going.
Speaker 1 (12:25):
To talk about it, Denver did a number on Minnesota's offense,
and I've talked about that all series is what they
have to do, and we're going to talk about that
in a minute, but I want to start on the
offensive end of the floor.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
First of all.
Speaker 1 (12:38):
One of the things I thought was interesting early is
Chris Finch went back to Anthony Edwards on Jamal Murray.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
I thought that was really weird because started.
Speaker 1 (12:46):
On Jamal Murray in Game one and lost him like
three times off the screens just in the first few minutes.
And they pulled him off of Jamal at the first
time out and they went to Jade McDaniels and Jade
McDaniels did the majority of the work on Jamal Murray
and game time two, and so it was really interesting
to me that they went back in game three because
he's not as good at this.
Speaker 2 (13:06):
Phase of his career.
Speaker 1 (13:07):
He's got a lot of work to learn in terms
of screen navigation, not as good as a screen navigator
as Jaden McDaniels, right, So I thought that was a
little weird, and that probably helped a little bit with
Jamal getting that initial kind of set up. But regardless
of what defender was on Jamal, whether it was Nikhil
Alexander Walker, Anthony Edwards, or Jaden McDaniels, from the early
(13:27):
part of the game, I thought the two things physically
that got Denver's offense going was better screening and better
setting up your man for screens. So let's start on
the setting up your man for screens thing. So when
you're on the ball, it's about a ball handling move,
some sort of dribble combination to get your defender onto
(13:47):
one side of you. When you get that defender onto
one side of you, it's much easier for the screener
to find an angle for him to actually set a
good pick. So for instance, if I want to get
on a screen going this way, if he's up in
my business, he can take that big step over the top.
I've shown this on film, and our film breakdown is
a bunch. If I'm chasing a guy over screen this way,
(14:08):
I didn't get my left foot over the top of
the screener's left foot so that I can get the
leverage to get over the top and meet you on
the other side. But if you make a dribble move
on me and I end up on this side of you,
if you get me way off onto the ball handler's
left hand side, then now I'm just in a trail
position the whole way through right and so on the ball.
Setting up your man for screens is about dribble combinations
(14:30):
to get the defender on the side away from the
screen right. Then when you're off the ball, it's about
getting contact. I thought Jamal did a really good job
of this from the opening tip of the game. When
he was off the ball, he'd sit down with his
hands on his knees and kind of relax and bite
his energy. And then what he would do is when
it was time to cut to the screen, he'd get
connected to the body right, he'd get into the defender's
(14:51):
body and then he would just take off and give
a little shove. Just take off, little shove, by the way,
totally legal. It's something you train kids to do from
the younger, right. That's just basic fundamental basketball. And again,
that's what's so frustrating about what happened in Game two.
Jamal got so worked up that he lost sight of
some of the fundamental things he could do to fight
through the ball pressure and to fight through some of
the physicality he was dealing with. We even talked about
(15:13):
just passing out of double teams, which he was doing
a poor job of in game two. Right, But in
this game, patience, hands on knees, waiting for the time
to cut, get connected, little push off, take off by
virtue of doing that everything I just described, whether it's
the ball handling piece or the off ball piece, it's
about getting that initial separation right. Once the initial separation exists,
(15:34):
there's a gap for Jokic to set in instead a
good screen. Second piece is Jokic setting a good screen.
And again, this is where it's you being the physical
aggressor you being the guy that's kicking their ass rather
than the other way around. As Jokic sets that good screen.
After Jamal Murray gets his man set up for the screen,
now there's a lot of separation as a Jamal comes
(15:54):
downhill right from there. We talk about the bracket all
the time in pick and roll coverage. Right, the bracket
is the drop coverage. Big is the bottom end of
the bracket, and the top end of the bracket is
the back pressure. It's the guy that's chasing over the
top of the screen and trying to funnel when you
have real separation from the on ball defender. That is
what allows Jamal Murray to go in different angles after
(16:16):
he comes off the screen and find a little soft
spot in the drop coverage for him to find his
pull up jumper. If Jaden McDaniels or whoever it is
that's on the ball is attached to Jamal over the screen,
then he can funnel. That's where the bracket can force
Jamal to drive into traffic. When he forces Jamal to
drive into traffic, his options are limited. He can't get
(16:38):
to the pull up because there's back pressure. Now he's
driving into the rim and he's gonna have a bunch
of issues there. Right, So everything comes down to getting
good separation from the on ball defender through setting your
man up for screens and setting a good screen. Once
that happens, Jamal has the freedom to work in that
mid range. That is what brings extra defenders over. That's
(16:59):
what actually for is the drop coverage big to come out,
because if this bracket can stay down here because this
guy's chasing him in, then then Rudy Gobert or Carltown's
whoever it is that's there, can easily guard both. But
as soon as he actually has to come out a
little bit, that is where you start running into issues
where the pocket pass gets open. And that's where we
(17:20):
see Jokic catching on the roll. And then when catches
on the role, then Rudy Gobert has to step up.
When Ridy Gobert steps up, that's where the lob passed
to Aaron Gordon is open. But none of it works
if you can't get separation from the on ball guy.
It is the initial cog in what makes Denver's offense work.
If I had to simplify it down to one thing,
Jamal Murray just got free so much easier tonight through
(17:45):
setting his man up for screens and through setting good screens.
From there he got his confidence. Then the tough shots
start going again. Now it's like, now it's the superstar
ability that Jamal Murray has to hit tough contested shots
when things are defended way well, that started to come
to the surface. But early on it was like easy
little driving layup, like easier shots in that in that
(18:08):
mid range and at the rim he got a wide
open catch and shoot three on the right wing. That
came more off of the virtue of their defense, which
we'll get to in a minute. But again, like I thought,
that was the main piece of it. From there, Denver's
offense functioned again. Once Denver's offense started functioning again, functioning again,
all of the role players started playing better. You got
what's his forty six points on twenty three shots out
(18:30):
of KCP, Michael Porter Junior and Aaron Gordon just way
better production than what you had been getting. Right, And honestly,
I thought, Nicole Jokicic, you know, I was expecting tonight
to go differently.
Speaker 2 (18:41):
I thought Minnesota would bring a better punch.
Speaker 1 (18:44):
I thought that this game would be closer, and I
thought that Jokis would really have to assert himself as
a score and to his credit, one of the things
he did in this game he identified early Jamal's got
it going, MPJ, Aaron Gordon and my and CACP.
Speaker 2 (19:01):
All look more comfortable.
Speaker 1 (19:03):
I don't need to force the action any functioned more
as just a cog in the offense and put up
a classic Yokic stat line twenty four points, fourteen rebounds,
nine a sis and then plus thirty and thirty eight minutes.
But by far, I would argue as even though we
broke down all that offensive piece of it, by far.
Going into the series, the biggest key I said for
(19:25):
Denver was this is different than the Lakers series in
the sense that the Lakers, you're just so much better
than them offensively that you can just out execute them
in any sort of late game situation. This series Minnesota
for the regular season, and in terms of their personnel,
they're not as good offensively. They've been amazing offensively in
this postseason run through the first six games. I want
to say they're the best offense in the in the NBA.
(19:47):
And Anthony Edwards was playing like a bona fide top
tier superstar and Nikhil Alexander Walker's been on fire. Carl
Towns has been amazing. They've been doing all this good
stuff right and so in a lot of ways. In
a lot of ways, like like we forget the fact
that Minnesota has had a tendency to be compromisable offensively,
teams have been able to get them out of rhythm
(20:07):
and cause some problems.
Speaker 2 (20:08):
Right.
Speaker 1 (20:10):
Well, what I said before the series is you have
to do more damage to Minnesota's offense than they do
to yours. And that was the most impressive part of
this Denver performance. They brought the physical ball pressure Nikole Jokic,
who fairly has been lambasted for being a bad defender
in this postseason. And guess what, He's been a bad
defender in this postseason for the first six games. By far,
(20:31):
his best defensive game of the playoffs tonight, three steals,
three blocks was way two things. In particular, way better
when he would come up up to the level of
the screen at containing Ant and not letting Ant get downhill.
And then secondly when he was in his deeper dropper
when he was helping active hands getting deflections and swipes.
There's that play where Ant got downhill right into the
(20:53):
short range and tried to rise up, but he exposed
the ball in the shooting pocket and Jokic swiped down
at it. As a team, I thought Denver to much
much better. Like it was weird out, Like in Game two,
you'd see Denver kind of over penetrate and like lose
control of the basketball, and then like four dudes would
be swiping down at it and somehow Minnesota would come
away with it. The same thing was happening for Denver tonight.
(21:13):
It'd be Minnesota that'd be over penetrating a little bit,
and then Jokis would knock the ball loose, and then
like four dudes would get on the ground and try
to go after the ball, and somehow someone with Denver
would come out from it and go the other way.
And that really is the key. They dominated the physical
battle tonight. They won the rebounds forty to thirty two.
They won offensive rebounds eight to five. They won turnovers
sixteen to eleven. They had seventeen points off of minnesota
(21:35):
sixteen turnovers. They won points in the paint thirty eight
to thirty four. Completely flipped the script. And again, like
that to me is the big psychological benefit from this game.
In addition to getting a win in the win column
that you desperately need because you need three more in
the next four games. In addition to that, you proved
to yourself that you are capable of hanging physically with
(21:56):
Minnesota in a way that you didn't in the first
two games on the Minnesota front, and like this, this
to me is a credit to Denver's defense. But they
played Minnesota into a lot of their bad tendencies. What
was the issue with Kat and aunt offensively throughout the
regular season, Like missing easy reads, settling for jump shots,
not using your physical tools to get close to the basket.
Speaker 2 (22:18):
Early in this game.
Speaker 1 (22:19):
Anthony Erwards just coming off of ball screens with seventeen
on the shot clock and pulling up from three over
a contest like it looked a lot more like regular
season Anthony Edwards. Now, he's been amazing for six games,
So I'm not about to like be like, oh, this
is the real ant. I'm just saying like he As
a team, they kind of functioned a lot more like
the regular season version of themselves. Inconsistent defensive energy and effort.
(22:41):
Like Chris Finch said after Game two, that was the
best defensive effort he had seen from that group. I
would venture to guess he's gonna say the exact opposite
tonight in his presser. It just was inconsistent from the jump,
not as good screen navigation, not as scrappy, not as physical.
Speaker 2 (22:53):
Now here's the thing.
Speaker 1 (22:54):
The whistle kind of turned a little bit against Minnesota,
And you know, I agree, it's infuriating that it's not
more consistent, Like I wish they just kind of pick
a level of physicality and stick with it. But for
the record, that's kind of a thing at every level
of basketball, at every level of basketball. You know, you
go into the game, it's like, we don't know how
this game is going to be reffed. And sometimes you
identify early like oh, they're letting everything go. Sometimes you
(23:16):
identify early like, oh, this is much more tiki tack,
right like Game one OKC Dallas, super ticky tack. Game
two OKC Dallas way more physical, a lot more stuff
gets let go, right Like, it's unfortunate that it's inconsistent,
but it's kind of part of the game, right. And
it was actually interesting because I didn't think Minnesota handled
it very well. They were complaining at the refs, they
(23:36):
were getting all worked up and again, that kind of
goes more to that psychological flip that I was talking
about earlier, but the poor shot selection and the foul
trouble too. Like Jade McDaniels, I think he's the best
perimeter defender in the league. You pick up three foulsand
in the first half, early second half. You have this
beautiful possession on Jamal Murray where you block him and
(23:57):
then after you block him, you foul him for no damnary.
After you cleanly defend him and block him, you just
hack him for no reason at the end of the possession.
That is a regular season issue that Minnesota had. Now,
as the game was kind of winding down, he was
on the sideline.
Speaker 2 (24:12):
He was like, hey, guys, this is just a this
is a series.
Speaker 1 (24:15):
This is just one game. There's a lot of basketball left.
They gotta be these four times out of five. He's right,
but it's not gonna be easy there. You can if
they continue to come out and play like regular season Minnesota,
Denver's just gonna win three more games in a row
and this series is gonna be over. Looking forward to
Game four, I expect it to be much closer. I
think you're gonna get a much more desperate Minnesota effort.
(24:36):
I think this game, the winner of this game is
gonna win the series. Just think about it. Minnesota wins
Game four, They're up three to one. Now Denver has
to beat you three times in a row, including a
game in Minnesota. That's not gonna be very easy. Minnesota's
already demonstrated they can win in Denver, right, Denver wins
to two, They've just won two straight on your home floor.
They're going home for Game five, the game five, and
(25:01):
Denver the arena is just gonna be on fire. That's
gonna be a really hard game to win. Now they're
coming back to Minnesota up three to two, and they
know they can beat you there because they just beat
you twice. Right, So, like I think the winner of
Game four is going to win the series. I think
it's gonna be a super close game. I think it's
gonna be more or less functioning as a game that
both teams view as a must win. I expect a
(25:23):
much better defensive effort from Minnesota from the jump. I
expect Chris Finch to likely go back to Jaden McDaniels
on Jamal Murray from the start of the game. I
expect a whistle that is a little bit less tight
and a little bit more physicality allowed. That's gonna be
a hell of a game Sunday evening, if I'm not mistaken.
I think myself and Colin Cowherd are going after that game.
(25:46):
But I'll keep you guys posted on my Twitter feed.
All right, let's move on to Nicks Pacers before we
get out of here for the night, and let's start
at the end first, because every Knicks game is completely insane.
Was the eighth time in nine postseason games that the
Knick sev ended up in a clutch situation at the
end of a game. They were six to one in
(26:07):
their first seven. Remember, clutch means within five points with
less than five minutes left. I want to start with
the late game sequence and we'll work into some of
the bigger picture concepts from there. So it's one O two,
one oh two, and Tyris Alliburn's running on a ball
screen on the left side of the floor hard and
signs in a high drop. Devincenzo's on the ball and
Halliburton just picks up his dribble for no damn reason,
and Siakam has a hard time disengaging from the screen
(26:30):
from Devincenzo, so he throws like a pass over the top,
ends up at.
Speaker 2 (26:32):
A turnover and they're running out the other way.
Speaker 1 (26:34):
Josh Hart's booking it towards the rim, and on that
play it kind of reminded me of the famous block
tyres Alliburtn swipes down on Josh Hart, makes him change
his release a little bit, which buys the time for
Miles Turner to get it back in. He swipes it
off the glass. They come running out the other way.
On the other the floor. In transition, Andrew Imhard gets
a close out opportunity on the right wing. He beats
(26:54):
brunts into the left and gets all the way to
the rim. Kind of sneaky little gamesman ship from Yakham.
When Hartenstein goes to help, Siakam kind of holds on
to him and as a result, there's no help at
the rim. And Andrew Nemar gets a layup, so it's
one O four to one O two. They go out
the other way, and Brunson's working against Nie Smith way
(27:16):
out at half court, and Haliburton throws a random double
team at him, and in the double team, Brunson just
drives to go around him and Haliburton just trips him.
Speaker 2 (27:25):
It was a stupid, bad foul. He goes to the line.
Speaker 1 (27:27):
He only goes one for two though, which by the way,
miss free throws continue to be a problem for the Knicks.
So at this point it's one o four to one
oh three Indiana. And this was a kind of a
crazy sequence. And this sequence ended up in a stop
for New York. But I thought it kind of in
a weird way set the stage for what was the
game winner later on. So it starts with Tyres Haliburton
(27:48):
rejecting a screen, quickly getting the defense in rotation, kick
out past the Miles Turner in the corner.
Speaker 2 (27:52):
Miles Turner kicks.
Speaker 1 (27:53):
It up the wing wide open, like check the wind,
you know, to sit there and take your swing as
time on a catch and shoot three for Andrew Nemhart
on the right wing, and he misses it.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
But on that play Miles Turner comes in.
Speaker 1 (28:06):
He gets a rebound, and by the way, he had
a couple of big offensive rebounds at the end of
this game. Then Haliburton just beats brunting off the dribble
on the left side of the floor, gets all the
way to the basket and smokes a layup. Turner comes
in again and taps it out, so it ends up
back in Halliburton's hands. He runs another ball screen, gets
hard and signed up to the level. Perfect pocket pass,
(28:27):
bang bang in rotation. Another wide open catch and shoot
three for Andrew Nemhart in the right corner, and he
misses it. Dante Divencenzo finally gets an offensive rebound. Two
reasons why I wanted to highlight that play. First, of
all those misses for Nemhart to two wide up a
catch and shoot misses, they allow him to kind of
build rhythm and to kind of think of it as
like dialing in his release. Oh, I left that one short.
(28:50):
He left the corner three short at the right corner
is dead on straight, but he left it short right.
Also Tyres Halliburton, who just continued at the end of
this game to generate quality shot after quality shot. Tygers
Haliburton was amazing. We're gonna get to him in a
bigger picture in a minute. So but anyway, New York
gets the stops one of four, one O three. They're
running out the other way and there on the other end,
(29:10):
Brunson gets aron Empart on a cross match, and remember
this was this was the matchup where adren Empart was
getting cooked all series and that was why Carlisle finally
switched over to Nie Smith on Brunson and he Brunson
tried to back him down, he's bullying him. Nemmar took
the contact, held his ground, forced Brunston to spin into
like a scoop shot with his offhand, which is obviously
(29:32):
a lower percentagehot and he missed it. So shout out
to adren Emhard. He's been getting barbecued by Brunston all series.
Got a huge stop on that play. Haliburton makes a
beautiful kick ahead pass because Siakam ends up up the
floor and beats everybody there. And again this is another
great thing about Halliburton. He just never misses the easy
reads that are available.
Speaker 2 (29:49):
In these games.
Speaker 1 (29:50):
Got a simple kick ahead pass right well, Seeaca beats
everyone down to the floor and we get the first
of the two giant Nick's mistakes at the end of
the game.
Speaker 2 (30:00):
Actually misses the layup in traffic.
Speaker 1 (30:02):
And Dante DiVincenzo, who was unbelievable all night, just was
an absolute monster. It was dead on from three was
doing some off the dribble creation, great in transition, great
in defense, just a great Dante de Vincenzo knight.
Speaker 2 (30:15):
But he makes a big mistake.
Speaker 1 (30:17):
Uh uh Siakam misses the layup and and uh brunt
or de Vincenzo comes in and swats at it and
gets called for goaltending. It had like no chance of
going in, So big mistake. Now it's one oh six
to one oh three. But to Jalen Brunston's credit, who
has had Aaron Nesmith in his face all night long,
just sticks a step back three in his face. Now
it's one oh six to one oh six. And again
(30:38):
Niemith did a great job on him all night. Just
a tough shot that Brunson made. So we go down
the other end. It's one o six, one oh six.
Haliburton gets a quick ball screen in transition, like a
little semi transition ball screen, gets a great look at
it right from that right wing spot, and just misses
the three. And I actually liked the shot too, because
even though it was early in the clock, there was
(30:59):
like thirty one thirty two seconds left in the game clock,
so it was like a two for one in a
tie game. So like, even if you miss that and
you give up the rebound, the Knicks are gonna go
down and if you get another stop, then you'll get
the final shot of the game.
Speaker 2 (31:11):
But Aaron E.
Speaker 1 (31:12):
Smith comes in, comes flying in and gets a tap
out rebound. And again this credit to the Pacers, and
we're gonna talk about why because the Knicks had to
go to a four guard lineup late. But the Pacers
got a bunch of key offensive rebounds late, so credit
to them. But in the cross match, off of the
chaos of the offensive rebound, Hartenstein ends up on Halliburn.
Speaker 2 (31:30):
Halliburn's working him off the.
Speaker 1 (31:31):
Dribble and the Knicks throw a random double team from
a Duce McBride with about four seconds left in the
shot clock. Haliburton basically throws a grenade to Nemhard because
he has no choice. He's not going to attack the double.
Nemhard has brunts and on him with four seconds on
the shot clock, and he just goes into that pound
table between the legs and to his step back. And
again he had dialed on that, he dialed in that release.
(31:54):
He just had two good looks and he's sure as
hell wasn't gonna leave this one short. Got a great lift,
I've got a great release and drills like a twenty
five foot step back three. And it was crazy because
it's the toughest one of the three. It was deeper,
it was more contested, it was off. The dribble didn't matter.
Huge shot from Andrew Nemhard. Now it's one o nine
to one oh six. Then we get to the second
(32:15):
big Knick's mistake. Late Jalen Brunson gets hacked by Andrew
Nemhard and in the process he just throws up a
bad shot. And here's the thing. You can't count on
the refs in that situation. Yes, occasionally a ref will
get whistle happy at the end of a game, and
it always is a big deal and we all hate it, right,
but most refs want the players to decide and they'll
(32:36):
sit back. If anything, I actually thought the ref, because
there was one ref in the right corner, had a
good angle on it. I think he didn't think Brunson
was gonna shoot. I think he saw Brunson holding the ball.
I think he saw nem Hard hack him, and I
think he thought Brunson's gonna pass it here. Anyway, I'm
not gonna worry about blowing the whistle, and then Brunson
decided on a delay to throw up a shot, which,
by the way, even if they called the foul, it
(32:57):
would have been on the ground right, And so Brunson
kind of tries to grift and throws up a really
bad shot. There were fourteen seconds left on the shot clock.
Now the one little bit of leeway I'd give to
Brunston there, and I don't think it's enough to justify it.
But in those kind of late game situations down three,
you are sometimes cognizant of the fact that they might
intentionally foul, and sometimes guys will throw up bad three
(33:19):
point shots to try to turn an intentional foul into
three points. But I thought Brunson rushed that because usually
that's under It's like outside of three seconds, inside of
ten seconds is usually where you see teams look to
intentionally foul, because inside of three second, outside of three secs,
like with less than three seconds left, you're usually scared
about the guy throwing up a shot right. And then
outside of three seconds left, it's almost like too early
(33:41):
to get into a free throw contest, and one misfree
throw and you're in some trouble right, So like I
didn't like that specific shot, but it is what it is.
The Pacers get the rebound, they close it out from there,
and the Pacers cut the series to two to one.
A couple of notes from the game, switching n Smith
onto Brunson. Brunston at twenty six point on twenty six shots,
six assists in five turnovers. It was his worst game
(34:03):
of the playoffs since Game two against Philly, and they
were just like Nie Smith was just in his jersey
from the jump, and the big thing is here. He's bigger,
he's stronger, he's a better athlete, he's better defender than
Andrew Emhart. I called for Nie Smith on Brunson at
the beginning of the series, and then I said it
needed to happen after game one because it was abundantly
clear that Jalen was really comfortable operating against Andren Emhart. Specifically,
(34:28):
he felt comfortable shooting over the top of him.
Speaker 2 (34:30):
Now here's the thing.
Speaker 1 (34:31):
Is Aaron Nee Smith some sort of magical Jalen Brunson stopper. No,
but he's your best chance.
Speaker 2 (34:37):
Again.
Speaker 1 (34:37):
I always talk about it like a range of outcomes
on any given night. Sometimes a guy's super dialed in.
He can go for forty something. Right, Sometimes a guy
is a rough shooting night and he goes for twenty
six points on twenty six shots, and then there's everything
in between, right, And really, when you when you play
better defense, you just make it more likely that player
(34:58):
will end up in the lower end of the outcome.
When you play worst defense, you make it more likely
that they'll end up in the high end of that outcome.
Speaker 2 (35:06):
Right.
Speaker 1 (35:06):
And so to me, it's not about a magic fix
for Brunson, it's just he's your best perimeter defender. So
why would you put a guy like Nemhard on who's
a good perimeter defender. But Brunson's been one of the
top five players in the league in this postseason, is
barbecuing everybody, and he's clearly having great nights, and he's
clearly very comfortable against Andrew Nemhart. So I like to
move to Neie Smith simply because give you the best
(35:30):
chance of playing Brunson into a rough shooting night, and
he had a rough shooting night. Honestly, it was a
testament to Jaylen Brunston that he was still able to
get going the way he did in that second half.
Tyers Halibert sixty nine points in the last two games
after I begged him to start scoring after Game one,
finally starting to look more explosive. Too early in the game,
there was a play two plays in particular in the
first half that kind of stood out to me. Get
(35:50):
hard and signed on a switch on the right wing,
late shot clock situation, and he beat him off the dribble,
low gather through a dig down and then made like
a tough scoop shot. Those were the beating the bigs
off the switches was a big thing that he was
doing in the early part of the season before his
hamstring injury, so I thought that was a good sign.
Speaker 2 (36:08):
And then that transition play.
Speaker 1 (36:09):
Where he just elevated and hit the finger roll over
like when he was getting sandwiched by like two athletes
at the rim like that was one of those plays
where I'm like, oh, he started to get some of
his explosion back. And then late in the game, I
thought he consistently generated quality shots just getting into ball screens,
getting downhill, getting into the lane, drawing in help defenders,
making the kickout passes. He was the guy who drew
(36:30):
the double team on the late possession that led to
the game winner. This is the tyress Alliburton that had
me so excited before the season. He has the potential
to be a bigger and more athletic Steve Natch. That's
his upside and I thought I like and he just
hasn't been able to kind of recapture that since the
hamstring injury. But these last two games have been the
first time that he's really started to look more like
(36:51):
the Tyres Alliburton from the start of the season. That
is super exciting that Tyres Alliburton has the potential to
be a top five player in this league. But the guy,
the guy between that, the guy after the injury, he
just wasn't explosive enough and not as consistent and efficient
enough as a score to do so. So really encouraging
to see him to get some of that back. Miles
Turner twenty one points and ten rebounds, several huge rebounds,
(37:13):
several huge offensive rebounds late in the game. Huge win
for Indiana, But you know how the Knicks are. Game
four is gonna be just as tough, right And I
just continue to be completely amazed by the Knicks. They
keep losing bodies, no Julius Randall, Noboy and Macdonovich, no
Mitchell Robinson, now nog And and Obi as well. Yet they
just keep finding guys that come in and contribute precious
(37:36):
to Chewa has been able to slot into that og
Anobe spot. Alec Burks came in in the first half
and was hitting jumpers and kind of recreating some of
that athleticism and shooting pop that og And and Obi had
at Duce McBride has ever since, really ever since the
Emmanuel Quickly trade, has stepped in and taken on more
responsibility and being great.
Speaker 2 (37:55):
Guys just keep coming.
Speaker 1 (37:56):
In and they keep continuing with the basketball character that
comes from their coach down and it just makes them
an incredibly likable team. There were three or four points
in the game tonight where I thought the Knicks might
just punt, and instead they won on a run, and
they came very close to winning that game. Dante de
Vincenzo doesn't commit a goaltend, you're right there and you
have a very good chance to win that game. And
even with that goaltend, it took an andream heard bailout
(38:19):
step back three in the final minute, right, So, like
I can see why Knicks fans love this team. They
just have truly remarkable basketball character. One basketball note though,
because of the ogn Andobe injury, they did have to
go to four guards late and went to duce McBride,
Josh Hart, Dantete de Vincenzo, and Jalen Bronson. I thought
it was the right call because I think duce McBride
(38:40):
was a little bit better and more reliable offensively than
Alec Burks was. But they did struggle to clean up
the offensive glass late, and that is the reality of
losing og Anobi. And as we heard from Adrian Morjanowski,
he's gonna be out for Game four and he's probably
gonna be out for Game five as well. So it's
gonna be tough. And this is gonna be a challenge
for the Knicks because their best line line up right
(39:00):
now really might be that four guard lineup in a
center and that's just gonna put you into some physical
predicaments and that showed up in that late game situation
against Antianda tonight. But again, even despite that, this close
all right, guys, that is all I have for tonight
is always I sincerely appreciate you guys for supporting me
and supporting the show. The plan as of right now
is we're just going live after the morning game tomorrow,
(39:21):
which I believe is Thunder. That's the Thunder MAVs game. Yeah,
so we're going live after the ABC game on Thunder MAVs.
We're gonna hit Boston Cleveland on Sunday morning. But I
will see you guys live on YouTube tomorrow after the final.
Speaker 2 (39:38):
Buzzer of Dallas of Dallas US case
Speaker 1 (40:05):
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(01:52):
welcome to tonight. You're at the volume. Happy Friday, everybody.
Hope all you guys are having a great start to
your weekend.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
Gonna hit both of tonight's games.
Speaker 1 (01:59):
The Denver Nuggets show some unbelievable championship medal, go into
Minnesota and somehow do a worst number on them than
Minnesota did to Denver in Game two and completely change
the psychology of that series. Obviously a lot of work
to do still to get the win if that's what
they're interested in, but a very dominant first step in
(02:20):
that direction tonight, and then the Indiana Pacers get a
much needed win to avoid the the vonted three to
zero hole against the New York Knicks to get another
crazy clutch Knicks game that the Pacers escape on a
game winner from Andrew Nemhard and a little bit of
a grifty mistake from Jalen Brunson late.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
Two excellent playoff games.
Speaker 1 (02:40):
We're gonna hit them both from the perspective of all
four teams. You guys are the Joe before we get started.
Subscribe to a brand new YouTube channel so you don't
miss any more of our videos. Follow me on Twitter
at underscore JCNLTS. You guys, don't miss an announcements. Don't forget
about a podcast feed wherever you get your podcast under
hoops tonight. In the last but not least, keep dropping
mail back questions in those YouTube comments. We can keep
hitting them throughout the post season. So let's talk some basketball.
(03:02):
I was so excited for this game. Honestly, like the
build up of the three full days off was actually
kind of nice because it just kind of built the
suspense for this specific game. I think these sourts of
situations are what generate the great moments in NBA history.
No one ever talked about a great moment in NBA
history that was a sweep.
Speaker 2 (03:23):
No one ever did. Sweeps are boring, they're dominant.
Speaker 1 (03:26):
What really brings the memorable the NBA history moments the
once we watch on NBA TV when we're watching old footage,
the one we tell stories about. They usually involve some
kind of adversity. This was one of the things, especially
as a younger basketball fan as I was in the
mid twenty tens, It's one of the things I didn't
(03:46):
like about the KD Warriors. They just beat the shit
out of everybody, and everyone was like it was cool
and it was a beautiful brand of basketball, and obviously
it was cool to see KD get to the mountaintop,
but like they won fifteen straight playoff games, Like they
won fifteen straight playoff games, so like it never had
(04:07):
that real, that feeling of like overcoming adversity. And I
got in trouble with some Nuggets fans yesterday for a
social media clip where I basically said, hey, this is
their first time with some real adversity, and everyone pointed out, well,
what about the you know, trying to win with faku
Compazo and and Will Barton, and it's like, yeah, yeah,
those were that was bad shit happening to your team.
(04:30):
But that wasn't adversity in the sense that there weren't
There were no expectations on that team. No one on
those teams, No one really expected Denver in twenty twenty
one or twenty twenty two to win with Nikola Jokic
by himself. If anything, it was like incredibly impressive that
he managed to beat that Portland team by himself. Right,
oh yeah, but we were down three to one in
the bubble. It's like, yeah, but that was kind of
(04:52):
your coming out party. No one really believed in in
that core until that. But the bubble is where Jamal Murray,
Nicole Jokic, that's where they kind of came to the
forefront as the as the one of the next great
kind of playoff corps that we see around the league.
Right the last year was the first time there was
real expectation on the Nuggets, and they passed with flying colors,
(05:15):
dominated most of the regular season, dominated in the postseason.
Came into this year, I thought it was a more
than fine kind of Denver regular season. Most of the
issues they had had to do with beating good teams
without Jamal Murray, which again is difficult. Anytime you're without firepower,
you're going to struggle against the good teams. But in
this series, this is the first time they have faced
(05:36):
true adversity where there's real expectations. You have the consensus
best player in the world, you are favored to win
the series, you have home court advantage, and you get
your ass kicked in Game two to go down two
before you head on the road to Minnesota. And again
this is what These are the types of scenarios that
breed those big moments. When you think back to the
(05:58):
best moments of Steph Curry's career, what do you think
you think about Game four against Boston in the twenty
twenty two NBA Finals when Boston Stolehork home court from
them and Boston beat them handling in Game three, and
Game four was like, we have to win this game
or we are going to lose the series. And Steph
(06:18):
has forty something, they win, he gets Finals MVP, they
win the trophy. That was an amazing moment, arguably the
best moment of Steph Curry's career, and it happened because
of adversity. In order for Lebron to go on the
road into Boston and drop forty five and humiliate that
team to tie the series and send it back to Miami,
(06:40):
there had to be adversity. They had to fall down
three games to two. They had to face a road
close out game. That's why I love these moments, and
that's why I was so excited for this particular game.
This was our first chance to see what desperate Denver
looked like.
Speaker 2 (06:55):
And Wow, that was unbelievable. They beat the shit out
of them.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
They completely dominated them mentally and physically throughout the game.
And I can't overstate how huge psychologically tonight was. Because
when you have a long shot task in front of you,
you need to believe that you can do it. Like
if you're trying to get into Harvard Law, you better
(07:21):
believe that you can do it, right, or you have
no chance. You're trying to be a professional athlete. It's
a one in a million shot, right, you better believe
you can do it. And I thought it was so
interesting after Game two when they had that practice and
Mike Michael Malone was quoting stats, is like, yeah, something
like this. Many teams have come back from down oh two.
(07:44):
This smaller number of teams have come back from down
oh two with losing the first two games at home.
But what was the first thing he said after that?
He's like, well, we've come down from three to one twice.
You can tell there's just that little inkling of belief
there at the beginning, Like, yeah, like having to win
four games in five tries against a team that has
like that's been literally constructed to beat us, That's a
(08:06):
lot to ask. It's a very difficult challenge that lays
in front of you, and you.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
Have to believe.
Speaker 1 (08:11):
And by virtue of going in there, you did two
things tonight. You got the series to two to one,
and you have effectively erased what happened in Game two,
not in the standings from the standpoint of the way
the series shook out, but simply in the psychological element
of that game. That game, as Mike Michael Malone Michael
(08:31):
Malone pointed out, was the game where Denver crumbled in
a way he had never seen them crumble before. And
the way they crumbled it they crumbled under physicality, they
crumbled under intensity, they crumbled under emotion, and like getting
into it, the refs, and like all of those factors
shifted heavily towards Denver. In game three, they conquered those demons.
(08:54):
Those demons popped up for one game and they immediately
conquered them. In game two. You not only did you
win in a domint fashion, you did so with your
offense breaking out in a way that it couldn't in
the first two games. You did so with Jamal Murray
looking like Jamal Murray again. Twenty four points, twenty one,
shots above fifty percent, shooting above forty percent from three
that that is huge.
Speaker 2 (09:16):
You demonstrated I'm Jamal Murray.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
I can do this, and I think that's important because again,
like coming out of that game, what did I say,
everyone was talking about the calf, And everyone was talking
about the calf again tonight, and I'm not gonna sit
here and underplay that and pretend like three full days
off doesn't help a guy with the calf injury. Of
course it does. And he definitely looked physically good tonight.
But the majority of the reason Jamal struggled in game
(09:43):
two had to do with him getting into it with
the refs and getting all worked up in emotional and
he lost sight of the ultimate goal, and he played
shitty basketball.
Speaker 2 (09:52):
That's why he lost.
Speaker 1 (09:54):
And in tonight's game, he handled the ball pressure better,
he set up his man for screens better, from the
from the opening tip, he just had a much more
focused basketball, non emotional basketball approach, and he was able
to flip the script. So many factors tilted his way
and so many factors tilted Denver's way, and it completely
(10:14):
changed the psychology of the series. I would argue you
even won convincingly enough to do some damage to Minnesota's belief.
That was the first time in seven postseason games that
Minnesota looked like the regular season Timberwolves. There are reasons
why I picked against Minnesota against Phoenix and why I
picked against Minnesota versus Denver, and it had to do
(10:35):
with actual things that happened on the court in the
regular season. Bad shot selection, inconsistent defensive effort like foul trouble,
all of these different things that ended up being issued
from Minnesota periodically throughout the regular season. They have avoided
those things in this postseason run, and man, did it
look like they regressed in a big way tonight. And
(10:55):
we're gonna get more into that later, but that to
me is the other part of this. You tilted a
lot of the mental dynamics in this series. So again,
I just before we get into some of the more
some of the more nitty gritty stuff with the basketball,
I just was so excited for this game because this
is where this stuff happens.
Speaker 2 (11:13):
This is where you get the cool moments.
Speaker 1 (11:14):
This is where when you tell the story of Nikola Jokic,
You'll when you tell the story of Jamal Murray, when
you tell the story of the Nuggets, you'll talk about
these kinds of moments.
Speaker 2 (11:22):
Right. They're the moments when things aren't going well. When
you look back, like.
Speaker 1 (11:27):
What's the least discussed championship in Lebron James's history, it's
usually the Bubble. Why because they dominated the regular season,
started twenty four and three, kicked everyone's butt, got into
the postseason, kicked everyone's butt. Even though they beat good
teams along the way, no one cared because they just
dominated everybody. You know, what are the ones that everyone remembers.
Coming back from three to one to beat Cleveland, Right,
(11:49):
coming back from three to two to beat Boston, coming
back from uh three two to beat San Antonio, Right,
that's that's where these big, real moments in NBA his
three come from. Let's talk about some of the basketball, though,
because like one of the things that I thought was
the defining characteristic of this game was if you had
(12:11):
to come put it down to one specific thing, it
would come down to Denver competing physically better. But that
manifests in a bunch of different ways. And the main
thing I want to focus on is how Denver got
their offense working.
Speaker 2 (12:22):
Now. I actually thought one of the the we're going.
Speaker 1 (12:25):
To talk about it, Denver did a number on Minnesota's offense,
and I've talked about that all series is what they
have to do, and we're going to talk about that
in a minute, but I want to start on the
offensive end of the floor.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
First of all.
Speaker 1 (12:38):
One of the things I thought was interesting early is
Chris Finch went back to Anthony Edwards on Jamal Murray.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
I thought that was really weird because started.
Speaker 1 (12:46):
On Jamal Murray in Game one and lost him like
three times off the screens just in the first few minutes.
And they pulled him off of Jamal at the first
time out and they went to Jade McDaniels and Jade
McDaniels did the majority of the work on Jamal Murray
and game time two, and so it was really interesting
to me that they went back in game three because
he's not as good at this.
Speaker 2 (13:06):
Phase of his career.
Speaker 1 (13:07):
He's got a lot of work to learn in terms
of screen navigation, not as good as a screen navigator
as Jaden McDaniels, right, So I thought that was a
little weird, and that probably helped a little bit with
Jamal getting that initial kind of set up. But regardless
of what defender was on Jamal, whether it was Nikhil
Alexander Walker, Anthony Edwards, or Jaden McDaniels, from the early
(13:27):
part of the game, I thought the two things physically
that got Denver's offense going was better screening and better
setting up your man for screens. So let's start on
the setting up your man for screens thing. So when
you're on the ball, it's about a ball handling move,
some sort of dribble combination to get your defender onto
(13:47):
one side of you. When you get that defender onto
one side of you, it's much easier for the screener
to find an angle for him to actually set a
good pick. So for instance, if I want to get
on a screen going this way, if he's up in
my business, he can take that big step over the top.
I've shown this on film, and our film breakdown is
a bunch. If I'm chasing a guy over screen this way,
(14:08):
I didn't get my left foot over the top of
the screener's left foot so that I can get the
leverage to get over the top and meet you on
the other side. But if you make a dribble move
on me and I end up on this side of you,
if you get me way off onto the ball handler's
left hand side, then now I'm just in a trail
position the whole way through right and so on the ball.
Setting up your man for screens is about dribble combinations
(14:30):
to get the defender on the side away from the
screen right. Then when you're off the ball, it's about
getting contact. I thought Jamal did a really good job
of this from the opening tip of the game. When
he was off the ball, he'd sit down with his
hands on his knees and kind of relax and bite
his energy. And then what he would do is when
it was time to cut to the screen, he'd get
connected to the body right, he'd get into the defender's
(14:51):
body and then he would just take off and give
a little shove. Just take off, little shove, by the way,
totally legal. It's something you train kids to do from
the younger, right. That's just basic fundamental basketball. And again,
that's what's so frustrating about what happened in Game two.
Jamal got so worked up that he lost sight of
some of the fundamental things he could do to fight
through the ball pressure and to fight through some of
the physicality he was dealing with. We even talked about
(15:13):
just passing out of double teams, which he was doing
a poor job of in game two. Right, But in
this game, patience, hands on knees, waiting for the time
to cut, get connected, little push off, take off by
virtue of doing that everything I just described, whether it's
the ball handling piece or the off ball piece, it's
about getting that initial separation right. Once the initial separation exists,
(15:34):
there's a gap for Jokic to set in instead a
good screen. Second piece is Jokic setting a good screen.
And again, this is where it's you being the physical
aggressor you being the guy that's kicking their ass rather
than the other way around. As Jokic sets that good screen.
After Jamal Murray gets his man set up for the screen,
now there's a lot of separation as a Jamal comes
(15:54):
downhill right from there. We talk about the bracket all
the time in pick and roll coverage. Right, the bracket
is the drop coverage. Big is the bottom end of
the bracket, and the top end of the bracket is
the back pressure. It's the guy that's chasing over the
top of the screen and trying to funnel when you
have real separation from the on ball defender. That is
what allows Jamal Murray to go in different angles after
(16:16):
he comes off the screen and find a little soft
spot in the drop coverage for him to find his
pull up jumper. If Jaden McDaniels or whoever it is
that's on the ball is attached to Jamal over the screen,
then he can funnel. That's where the bracket can force
Jamal to drive into traffic. When he forces Jamal to
drive into traffic, his options are limited. He can't get
(16:38):
to the pull up because there's back pressure. Now he's
driving into the rim and he's gonna have a bunch
of issues there. Right, So everything comes down to getting
good separation from the on ball defender through setting your
man up for screens and setting a good screen. Once
that happens, Jamal has the freedom to work in that
mid range. That is what brings extra defenders over. That's
(16:59):
what actually for is the drop coverage big to come out,
because if this bracket can stay down here because this
guy's chasing him in, then then Rudy Gobert or Carltown's
whoever it is that's there, can easily guard both. But
as soon as he actually has to come out a
little bit, that is where you start running into issues
where the pocket pass gets open. And that's where we
(17:20):
see Jokic catching on the roll. And then when catches
on the role, then Rudy Gobert has to step up.
When Ridy Gobert steps up, that's where the lob passed
to Aaron Gordon is open. But none of it works
if you can't get separation from the on ball guy.
It is the initial cog in what makes Denver's offense work.
If I had to simplify it down to one thing,
Jamal Murray just got free so much easier tonight through
(17:45):
setting his man up for screens and through setting good screens.
From there he got his confidence. Then the tough shots
start going again. Now it's like, now it's the superstar
ability that Jamal Murray has to hit tough contested shots
when things are defended way well, that started to come
to the surface. But early on it was like easy
little driving layup, like easier shots in that in that
(18:08):
mid range and at the rim he got a wide
open catch and shoot three on the right wing. That
came more off of the virtue of their defense, which
we'll get to in a minute. But again, like I thought,
that was the main piece of it. From there, Denver's
offense functioned again. Once Denver's offense started functioning again, functioning again,
all of the role players started playing better. You got
what's his forty six points on twenty three shots out
(18:30):
of KCP, Michael Porter Junior and Aaron Gordon just way
better production than what you had been getting. Right, And honestly,
I thought, Nicole Jokicic, you know, I was expecting tonight
to go differently.
Speaker 2 (18:41):
I thought Minnesota would bring a better punch.
Speaker 1 (18:44):
I thought that this game would be closer, and I
thought that Jokis would really have to assert himself as
a score and to his credit, one of the things
he did in this game he identified early Jamal's got
it going, MPJ, Aaron Gordon and my and CACP.
Speaker 2 (19:01):
All look more comfortable.
Speaker 1 (19:03):
I don't need to force the action any functioned more
as just a cog in the offense and put up
a classic Yokic stat line twenty four points, fourteen rebounds,
nine a sis and then plus thirty and thirty eight minutes.
But by far, I would argue as even though we
broke down all that offensive piece of it, by far.
Going into the series, the biggest key I said for
(19:25):
Denver was this is different than the Lakers series in
the sense that the Lakers, you're just so much better
than them offensively that you can just out execute them
in any sort of late game situation. This series Minnesota
for the regular season, and in terms of their personnel,
they're not as good offensively. They've been amazing offensively in
this postseason run through the first six games. I want
to say they're the best offense in the in the NBA.
(19:47):
And Anthony Edwards was playing like a bona fide top
tier superstar and Nikhil Alexander Walker's been on fire. Carl
Towns has been amazing. They've been doing all this good
stuff right and so in a lot of ways. In
a lot of ways, like like we forget the fact
that Minnesota has had a tendency to be compromisable offensively,
teams have been able to get them out of rhythm
(20:07):
and cause some problems.
Speaker 2 (20:08):
Right.
Speaker 1 (20:10):
Well, what I said before the series is you have
to do more damage to Minnesota's offense than they do
to yours. And that was the most impressive part of
this Denver performance. They brought the physical ball pressure Nikole Jokic,
who fairly has been lambasted for being a bad defender
in this postseason. And guess what, He's been a bad
defender in this postseason for the first six games. By far,
(20:31):
his best defensive game of the playoffs tonight, three steals,
three blocks was way two things. In particular, way better
when he would come up up to the level of
the screen at containing Ant and not letting Ant get downhill.
And then secondly when he was in his deeper dropper
when he was helping active hands getting deflections and swipes.
There's that play where Ant got downhill right into the
(20:53):
short range and tried to rise up, but he exposed
the ball in the shooting pocket and Jokic swiped down
at it. As a team, I thought Denver to much
much better. Like it was weird out, Like in Game two,
you'd see Denver kind of over penetrate and like lose
control of the basketball, and then like four dudes would
be swiping down at it and somehow Minnesota would come
away with it. The same thing was happening for Denver tonight.
(21:13):
It'd be Minnesota that'd be over penetrating a little bit,
and then Jokis would knock the ball loose, and then
like four dudes would get on the ground and try
to go after the ball, and somehow someone with Denver
would come out from it and go the other way.
And that really is the key. They dominated the physical
battle tonight. They won the rebounds forty to thirty two.
They won offensive rebounds eight to five. They won turnovers
sixteen to eleven. They had seventeen points off of minnesota
(21:35):
sixteen turnovers. They won points in the paint thirty eight
to thirty four. Completely flipped the script. And again, like
that to me is the big psychological benefit from this game.
In addition to getting a win in the win column
that you desperately need because you need three more in
the next four games. In addition to that, you proved
to yourself that you are capable of hanging physically with
(21:56):
Minnesota in a way that you didn't in the first
two games on the Minnesota front, and like this, this
to me is a credit to Denver's defense. But they
played Minnesota into a lot of their bad tendencies. What
was the issue with Kat and aunt offensively throughout the
regular season, Like missing easy reads, settling for jump shots,
not using your physical tools to get close to the basket.
Speaker 2 (22:18):
Early in this game.
Speaker 1 (22:19):
Anthony Erwards just coming off of ball screens with seventeen
on the shot clock and pulling up from three over
a contest like it looked a lot more like regular
season Anthony Edwards. Now, he's been amazing for six games,
So I'm not about to like be like, oh, this
is the real ant. I'm just saying like he As
a team, they kind of functioned a lot more like
the regular season version of themselves. Inconsistent defensive energy and effort.
(22:41):
Like Chris Finch said after Game two, that was the
best defensive effort he had seen from that group. I
would venture to guess he's gonna say the exact opposite
tonight in his presser. It just was inconsistent from the jump,
not as good screen navigation, not as scrappy, not as physical.
Speaker 2 (22:53):
Now here's the thing.
Speaker 1 (22:54):
The whistle kind of turned a little bit against Minnesota,
And you know, I agree, it's infuriating that it's not
more consistent, Like I wish they just kind of pick
a level of physicality and stick with it. But for
the record, that's kind of a thing at every level
of basketball, at every level of basketball. You know, you
go into the game, it's like, we don't know how
this game is going to be reffed. And sometimes you
identify early like oh, they're letting everything go. Sometimes you
(23:16):
identify early like, oh, this is much more tiki tack,
right like Game one OKC Dallas, super ticky tack. Game
two OKC Dallas way more physical, a lot more stuff
gets let go, right Like, it's unfortunate that it's inconsistent,
but it's kind of part of the game, right. And
it was actually interesting because I didn't think Minnesota handled
it very well. They were complaining at the refs, they
(23:36):
were getting all worked up and again, that kind of
goes more to that psychological flip that I was talking
about earlier, but the poor shot selection and the foul
trouble too. Like Jade McDaniels, I think he's the best
perimeter defender in the league. You pick up three foulsand
in the first half, early second half. You have this
beautiful possession on Jamal Murray where you block him and
(23:57):
then after you block him, you foul him for no damnary.
After you cleanly defend him and block him, you just
hack him for no reason at the end of the possession.
That is a regular season issue that Minnesota had. Now,
as the game was kind of winding down, he was
on the sideline.
Speaker 2 (24:12):
He was like, hey, guys, this is just a this
is a series.
Speaker 1 (24:15):
This is just one game. There's a lot of basketball left.
They gotta be these four times out of five. He's right,
but it's not gonna be easy there. You can if
they continue to come out and play like regular season Minnesota,
Denver's just gonna win three more games in a row
and this series is gonna be over. Looking forward to
Game four, I expect it to be much closer. I
think you're gonna get a much more desperate Minnesota effort.
(24:36):
I think this game, the winner of this game is
gonna win the series. Just think about it. Minnesota wins
Game four, They're up three to one. Now Denver has
to beat you three times in a row, including a
game in Minnesota. That's not gonna be very easy. Minnesota's
already demonstrated they can win in Denver, right, Denver wins
to two, They've just won two straight on your home floor.
They're going home for Game five, the game five, and
(25:01):
Denver the arena is just gonna be on fire. That's
gonna be a really hard game to win. Now they're
coming back to Minnesota up three to two, and they
know they can beat you there because they just beat
you twice. Right, So, like I think the winner of
Game four is going to win the series. I think
it's gonna be a super close game. I think it's
gonna be more or less functioning as a game that
both teams view as a must win. I expect a
(25:23):
much better defensive effort from Minnesota from the jump. I
expect Chris Finch to likely go back to Jaden McDaniels
on Jamal Murray from the start of the game. I
expect a whistle that is a little bit less tight
and a little bit more physicality allowed. That's gonna be
a hell of a game Sunday evening, if I'm not mistaken.
I think myself and Colin Cowherd are going after that game.
(25:46):
But I'll keep you guys posted on my Twitter feed.
All right, let's move on to Nicks Pacers before we
get out of here for the night, and let's start
at the end first, because every Knicks game is completely insane.
Was the eighth time in nine postseason games that the
Knick sev ended up in a clutch situation at the
end of a game. They were six to one in
(26:07):
their first seven. Remember, clutch means within five points with
less than five minutes left. I want to start with
the late game sequence and we'll work into some of
the bigger picture concepts from there. So it's one O two,
one oh two, and Tyris Alliburn's running on a ball
screen on the left side of the floor hard and
signs in a high drop. Devincenzo's on the ball and
Halliburton just picks up his dribble for no damn reason,
and Siakam has a hard time disengaging from the screen
(26:30):
from Devincenzo, so he throws like a pass over the top,
ends up at.
Speaker 2 (26:32):
A turnover and they're running out the other way.
Speaker 1 (26:34):
Josh Hart's booking it towards the rim, and on that
play it kind of reminded me of the famous block
tyres Alliburtn swipes down on Josh Hart, makes him change
his release a little bit, which buys the time for
Miles Turner to get it back in. He swipes it
off the glass. They come running out the other way.
On the other the floor. In transition, Andrew Imhard gets
a close out opportunity on the right wing. He beats
(26:54):
brunts into the left and gets all the way to
the rim. Kind of sneaky little gamesman ship from Yakham.
When Hartenstein goes to help, Siakam kind of holds on
to him and as a result, there's no help at
the rim. And Andrew Nemar gets a layup, so it's
one O four to one O two. They go out
the other way, and Brunson's working against Nie Smith way
(27:16):
out at half court, and Haliburton throws a random double
team at him, and in the double team, Brunson just
drives to go around him and Haliburton just trips him.
Speaker 2 (27:25):
It was a stupid, bad foul. He goes to the line.
Speaker 1 (27:27):
He only goes one for two though, which by the way,
miss free throws continue to be a problem for the Knicks.
So at this point it's one o four to one
oh three Indiana. And this was a kind of a
crazy sequence. And this sequence ended up in a stop
for New York. But I thought it kind of in
a weird way set the stage for what was the
game winner later on. So it starts with Tyres Haliburton
(27:48):
rejecting a screen, quickly getting the defense in rotation, kick
out past the Miles Turner in the corner.
Speaker 2 (27:52):
Miles Turner kicks.
Speaker 1 (27:53):
It up the wing wide open, like check the wind,
you know, to sit there and take your swing as
time on a catch and shoot three for Andrew Nemhart
on the right wing, and he misses it.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
But on that play Miles Turner comes in.
Speaker 1 (28:06):
He gets a rebound, and by the way, he had
a couple of big offensive rebounds at the end of
this game. Then Haliburton just beats brunting off the dribble
on the left side of the floor, gets all the
way to the basket and smokes a layup. Turner comes
in again and taps it out, so it ends up
back in Halliburton's hands. He runs another ball screen, gets
hard and signed up to the level. Perfect pocket pass,
(28:27):
bang bang in rotation. Another wide open catch and shoot
three for Andrew Nemhart in the right corner, and he
misses it. Dante Divencenzo finally gets an offensive rebound. Two
reasons why I wanted to highlight that play. First, of
all those misses for Nemhart to two wide up a
catch and shoot misses, they allow him to kind of
build rhythm and to kind of think of it as
like dialing in his release. Oh, I left that one short.
(28:50):
He left the corner three short at the right corner
is dead on straight, but he left it short right.
Also Tyres Halliburton, who just continued at the end of
this game to generate quality shot after quality shot. Tygers
Haliburton was amazing. We're gonna get to him in a
bigger picture in a minute. So but anyway, New York
gets the stops one of four, one O three. They're
running out the other way and there on the other end,
(29:10):
Brunson gets aron Empart on a cross match, and remember
this was this was the matchup where adren Empart was
getting cooked all series and that was why Carlisle finally
switched over to Nie Smith on Brunson and he Brunson
tried to back him down, he's bullying him. Nemmar took
the contact, held his ground, forced Brunston to spin into
like a scoop shot with his offhand, which is obviously
(29:32):
a lower percentagehot and he missed it. So shout out
to adren Emhard. He's been getting barbecued by Brunston all series.
Got a huge stop on that play. Haliburton makes a
beautiful kick ahead pass because Siakam ends up up the
floor and beats everybody there. And again this is another
great thing about Halliburton. He just never misses the easy
reads that are available.
Speaker 2 (29:49):
In these games.
Speaker 1 (29:50):
Got a simple kick ahead pass right well, Seeaca beats
everyone down to the floor and we get the first
of the two giant Nick's mistakes at the end of
the game.
Speaker 2 (30:00):
Actually misses the layup in traffic.
Speaker 1 (30:02):
And Dante DiVincenzo, who was unbelievable all night, just was
an absolute monster. It was dead on from three was
doing some off the dribble creation, great in transition, great
in defense, just a great Dante de Vincenzo knight.
Speaker 2 (30:15):
But he makes a big mistake.
Speaker 1 (30:17):
Uh uh Siakam misses the layup and and uh brunt
or de Vincenzo comes in and swats at it and
gets called for goaltending. It had like no chance of
going in, So big mistake. Now it's one oh six
to one oh three. But to Jalen Brunston's credit, who
has had Aaron Nesmith in his face all night long,
just sticks a step back three in his face. Now
it's one oh six to one oh six. And again
(30:38):
Niemith did a great job on him all night. Just
a tough shot that Brunson made. So we go down
the other end. It's one o six, one oh six.
Haliburton gets a quick ball screen in transition, like a
little semi transition ball screen, gets a great look at
it right from that right wing spot, and just misses
the three. And I actually liked the shot too, because
even though it was early in the clock, there was
(30:59):
like thirty one thirty two seconds left in the game clock,
so it was like a two for one in a
tie game. So like, even if you miss that and
you give up the rebound, the Knicks are gonna go
down and if you get another stop, then you'll get
the final shot of the game.
Speaker 2 (31:11):
But Aaron E.
Speaker 1 (31:12):
Smith comes in, comes flying in and gets a tap
out rebound. And again this credit to the Pacers, and
we're gonna talk about why because the Knicks had to
go to a four guard lineup late. But the Pacers
got a bunch of key offensive rebounds late, so credit
to them. But in the cross match, off of the
chaos of the offensive rebound, Hartenstein ends up on Halliburn.
Speaker 2 (31:30):
Halliburn's working him off the.
Speaker 1 (31:31):
Dribble and the Knicks throw a random double team from
a Duce McBride with about four seconds left in the
shot clock. Haliburton basically throws a grenade to Nemhard because
he has no choice. He's not going to attack the double.
Nemhard has brunts and on him with four seconds on
the shot clock, and he just goes into that pound
table between the legs and to his step back. And
again he had dialed on that, he dialed in that release.
(31:54):
He just had two good looks and he's sure as
hell wasn't gonna leave this one short. Got a great lift,
I've got a great release and drills like a twenty
five foot step back three. And it was crazy because
it's the toughest one of the three. It was deeper,
it was more contested, it was off. The dribble didn't matter.
Huge shot from Andrew Nemhard. Now it's one o nine
to one oh six. Then we get to the second
(32:15):
big Knick's mistake. Late Jalen Brunson gets hacked by Andrew
Nemhard and in the process he just throws up a
bad shot. And here's the thing. You can't count on
the refs in that situation. Yes, occasionally a ref will
get whistle happy at the end of a game, and
it always is a big deal and we all hate it, right,
but most refs want the players to decide and they'll
(32:36):
sit back. If anything, I actually thought the ref, because
there was one ref in the right corner, had a
good angle on it. I think he didn't think Brunson
was gonna shoot. I think he saw Brunson holding the ball.
I think he saw nem Hard hack him, and I
think he thought Brunson's gonna pass it here. Anyway, I'm
not gonna worry about blowing the whistle, and then Brunson
decided on a delay to throw up a shot, which,
by the way, even if they called the foul, it
(32:57):
would have been on the ground right, And so Brunson
kind of tries to grift and throws up a really
bad shot. There were fourteen seconds left on the shot clock.
Now the one little bit of leeway I'd give to
Brunston there, and I don't think it's enough to justify it.
But in those kind of late game situations down three,
you are sometimes cognizant of the fact that they might
intentionally foul, and sometimes guys will throw up bad three
(33:19):
point shots to try to turn an intentional foul into
three points. But I thought Brunson rushed that because usually
that's under It's like outside of three seconds, inside of
ten seconds is usually where you see teams look to
intentionally foul, because inside of three second, outside of three secs,
like with less than three seconds left, you're usually scared
about the guy throwing up a shot right. And then
outside of three seconds left, it's almost like too early
(33:41):
to get into a free throw contest, and one misfree
throw and you're in some trouble right, So like I
didn't like that specific shot, but it is what it is.
The Pacers get the rebound, they close it out from there,
and the Pacers cut the series to two to one.
A couple of notes from the game, switching n Smith
onto Brunson. Brunston at twenty six point on twenty six shots,
six assists in five turnovers. It was his worst game
(34:03):
of the playoffs since Game two against Philly, and they
were just like Nie Smith was just in his jersey
from the jump, and the big thing is here. He's bigger,
he's stronger, he's a better athlete, he's better defender than
Andrew Emhart. I called for Nie Smith on Brunson at
the beginning of the series, and then I said it
needed to happen after game one because it was abundantly
clear that Jalen was really comfortable operating against Andren Emhart. Specifically,
(34:28):
he felt comfortable shooting over the top of him.
Speaker 2 (34:30):
Now here's the thing.
Speaker 1 (34:31):
Is Aaron Nee Smith some sort of magical Jalen Brunson stopper. No,
but he's your best chance.
Speaker 2 (34:37):
Again.
Speaker 1 (34:37):
I always talk about it like a range of outcomes
on any given night. Sometimes a guy's super dialed in.
He can go for forty something. Right, Sometimes a guy
is a rough shooting night and he goes for twenty
six points on twenty six shots, and then there's everything
in between, right, And really, when you when you play
better defense, you just make it more likely that player
(34:58):
will end up in the lower end of the outcome.
When you play worst defense, you make it more likely
that they'll end up in the high end of that outcome.
Speaker 2 (35:06):
Right.
Speaker 1 (35:06):
And so to me, it's not about a magic fix
for Brunson, it's just he's your best perimeter defender. So
why would you put a guy like Nemhard on who's
a good perimeter defender. But Brunson's been one of the
top five players in the league in this postseason, is
barbecuing everybody, and he's clearly having great nights, and he's
clearly very comfortable against Andrew Nemhart. So I like to
move to Neie Smith simply because give you the best
(35:30):
chance of playing Brunson into a rough shooting night, and
he had a rough shooting night. Honestly, it was a
testament to Jaylen Brunston that he was still able to
get going the way he did in that second half.
Tyers Halibert sixty nine points in the last two games
after I begged him to start scoring after Game one,
finally starting to look more explosive. Too early in the game,
there was a play two plays in particular in the
first half that kind of stood out to me. Get
(35:50):
hard and signed on a switch on the right wing,
late shot clock situation, and he beat him off the dribble,
low gather through a dig down and then made like
a tough scoop shot. Those were the beating the bigs
off the switches was a big thing that he was
doing in the early part of the season before his
hamstring injury, so I thought that was a good sign.
Speaker 2 (36:08):
And then that transition play.
Speaker 1 (36:09):
Where he just elevated and hit the finger roll over
like when he was getting sandwiched by like two athletes
at the rim like that was one of those plays
where I'm like, oh, he started to get some of
his explosion back. And then late in the game, I
thought he consistently generated quality shots just getting into ball screens,
getting downhill, getting into the lane, drawing in help defenders,
making the kickout passes. He was the guy who drew
(36:30):
the double team on the late possession that led to
the game winner. This is the tyress Alliburton that had
me so excited before the season. He has the potential
to be a bigger and more athletic Steve Natch. That's
his upside and I thought I like and he just
hasn't been able to kind of recapture that since the
hamstring injury. But these last two games have been the
first time that he's really started to look more like
(36:51):
the Tyres Alliburton from the start of the season. That
is super exciting that Tyres Alliburton has the potential to
be a top five player in this league. But the guy,
the guy between that, the guy after the injury, he
just wasn't explosive enough and not as consistent and efficient
enough as a score to do so. So really encouraging
to see him to get some of that back. Miles
Turner twenty one points and ten rebounds, several huge rebounds,
(37:13):
several huge offensive rebounds late in the game. Huge win
for Indiana, But you know how the Knicks are. Game
four is gonna be just as tough, right And I
just continue to be completely amazed by the Knicks. They
keep losing bodies, no Julius Randall, Noboy and Macdonovich, no
Mitchell Robinson, now nog And and Obi as well. Yet they
just keep finding guys that come in and contribute precious
(37:36):
to Chewa has been able to slot into that og
Anobe spot. Alec Burks came in in the first half
and was hitting jumpers and kind of recreating some of
that athleticism and shooting pop that og And and Obi had
at Duce McBride has ever since, really ever since the
Emmanuel Quickly trade, has stepped in and taken on more
responsibility and being great.
Speaker 2 (37:55):
Guys just keep coming.
Speaker 1 (37:56):
In and they keep continuing with the basketball character that
comes from their coach down and it just makes them
an incredibly likable team. There were three or four points
in the game tonight where I thought the Knicks might
just punt, and instead they won on a run, and
they came very close to winning that game. Dante de
Vincenzo doesn't commit a goaltend, you're right there and you
have a very good chance to win that game. And
even with that goaltend, it took an andream heard bailout
(38:19):
step back three in the final minute, right, So, like
I can see why Knicks fans love this team. They
just have truly remarkable basketball character. One basketball note though,
because of the ogn Andobe injury, they did have to
go to four guards late and went to duce McBride,
Josh Hart, Dantete de Vincenzo, and Jalen Bronson. I thought
it was the right call because I think duce McBride
(38:40):
was a little bit better and more reliable offensively than
Alec Burks was. But they did struggle to clean up
the offensive glass late, and that is the reality of
losing og Anobi. And as we heard from Adrian Morjanowski,
he's gonna be out for Game four and he's probably
gonna be out for Game five as well. So it's
gonna be tough. And this is gonna be a challenge
for the Knicks because their best line line up right
(39:00):
now really might be that four guard lineup in a
center and that's just gonna put you into some physical
predicaments and that showed up in that late game situation
against Antianda tonight. But again, even despite that, this close
all right, guys, that is all I have for tonight
is always I sincerely appreciate you guys for supporting me
and supporting the show. The plan as of right now
is we're just going live after the morning game tomorrow,
(39:21):
which I believe is Thunder. That's the Thunder MAVs game. Yeah,
so we're going live after the ABC game on Thunder MAVs.
We're gonna hit Boston Cleveland on Sunday morning. But I
will see you guys live on YouTube tomorrow after the final.
Speaker 2 (39:38):
Buzzer of Dallas of Dallas US case
Speaker 1 (40:05):
The volume
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